A quiet notice V2Melody closes at midnight on , Spanish time.

Closes

A note from Richard

V2Melody will close at midnight on 20 January 2028

This site has been a retirement project in musical poetry: poems chosen with care and set to music, offered freely for as long as it felt right to keep the garden open.

The work no longer holds the place it once did in my life. I have gone as far with it as I wish to go. Like a sand mandala, it was made to be completed and then released. I am not attached to its permanence, and I do not believe any of it needs to last beyond the time it was given. The poems were already here before I arrived and began to experiment with them. They will still be here when these musical experiments, and indeed myself, have been swept away, like the sand of a mandala. Nothing has been lost.

I want a simpler end to my life, days of simple love and enjoyment with my wonderful wife of 20 years. The work of maintaining a server, the monitoring, and the residual obligations that come with keeping a site alive no longer fit that life.

From 4 November 2026 I will not be adding new poems or musical poems to the site.

The experimental music I am making now is on my Suno profile. Those pieces stay there, and are not added to this site.

Until midnight on 20 January 2028, Spanish time, everything remains available exactly as it is. That is when my VPS server contract comes to an end, and it will not be renewed. After that, the server will be switched off and the site will disappear.

The Mandala Is Finished explains this more fully.

Thank you to anyone who found a poem, a track, or a quiet moment here.

The pleasure was in the making.

Richard

Home › Glossary › Letter R

Raven

Birds
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

Want to hear it? Click the Listen button to hear the browser speak the word using text-to-speech!

The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

Trickster and creator figure in Pacific Northwest indigenous myths

Detailed Definition
Raven steals the sun, releases humans from a clamshell, and shapes the world through mischief. He embodies transformation, curiosity, and the origin of light. Poets reference him to symbolize creativity, the birth of consciousness, and the sacred role of the trickster in cultural genesis.
Example
Example in poetry:
Raven appears in Pacific Northwest poetry: "Raven steals the sun— / carries it in his beak, / spills light across the world"; In creation myths retold in verse: "Before dawn, Raven yawned— / and stars tumbled from his mouth, / lighting the first night"; Poets use him to explore transformation: "Raven turns himself to leaf, / to fish, to man— / change is his only law"; He symbolizes curiosity and chaos: "Raven opens the clamshell— / humans crawl out, blinking, / into his bright mischief"; In modern poetry, he represents cultural survival: "Colonizers banned our stories— / but Raven flew underground, / whispering myths in secret"; Contemporary poets link him to ecology: "Raven watches pipelines— / his croak warns: ‘This land / remembers who stole it’"
Additional Notes
Raven, a central trickster and creator figure in Pacific Northwest Native American myths (e.g., Haida, Tlingit), steals the sun, releases humans from a clamshell, and shapes the world through mischief. In poetry, Raven symbolizes transformation, curiosity, cultural genesis, and the sacred role of the trickster. When referencing Raven, honor specific tribal traditions and avoid pan-Indigenous generalizations. His dual nature—creator and clown—makes him ideal for poems about innovation, survival, and the birth of consciousness. Related figures include Coyote and Iktomi; key themes include shape-shifting, oral storytelling, and the interplay of chaos and order in world-making.
Also Known As
The Trickster Raven The Bringer of Light The Shape-Shifting Corvid corby Bran
Skip to main content